Unsettled
by BoltcasterGirlie
Summary: Slash. Scott and Logan change a lightbulb one night.


Title: Unsettled  
By: Glowstick Chick  
Rated: PG-13  
Category: X-Men, Scott/Logan, slash  
Archive: Of course, just email me!  
  
Summary: Scott and Logan change a lightbulb one night.  
  
Disclaimer: Hello, slash themes. Nothing graphic, but if you're not into that type of thing, evacuate while you still can! And yes, I know, Marvel owns us, not vice versa. They had better not sue me, they're already millionaires.  
  
Note: It's based mostly on movie canon, if anything. I would place it just before Logan leaves the mansion, assuming a week or two has passed after the ordeal with Magneto.   
  
Feel free to let me know what you think at glowstickchick@startrekmail.com or review on fanfiction.net.  
  
  
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Unsettled  
  
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12:05 A.M.  
  
"What are you doin', Cyke? Just screw it in there."  
  
I guess my mind had wandered. Well, that brought me right back. He's leaning against the counter of the dimly lit kitchen, looking up at me. I'm standing on a short metal stepladder, one arm stretched up toward the ceiling, clutching a lightbulb in that hand and an unwieldy glass fixture in the other. "What?" I ask dumbly.  
  
Logan is giving me that peculiar arched eyebrow again. I've gotten it a lot lately. Then again, I've probably deserved it. "I said clap your hands and jump up and down," he deadpans. "Past your bedtime, Scott?"  
  
Bedtime. Oh, come on, Scott, concentrate. Changing the lightbulb. Changing the lightbulb. Just keep your mind clear. Is that such a hard thing to do?  
  
That's one question I can answer. Next to impossible with him around. I know they all think I hate him. They're not that far off, really. I hate that all he has to do is show up on the Professor's proverbial radar screen, and suddenly he's the center of everyone's attention. Not excluding me. And that's what disturbs me the most. There's just something about him that I... God, it makes me crazy just thinking about it. The things he could do... I keep kicking myself every time those thoughts get dangerous. I keep reminding myself I have Jean, but it's like they say. You always want what you can't have...  
  
"Cyclops, do you even know where to stick that thing?"  
  
It's like he'd reached out with those strong, solid, powerful hands and pushed me right off the stepladder. It catches me so off guard I lose my balance, my foot slips off the edge of the step, and the light fixture just misses shattering as I crash down into the counter.  
  
Nice, Scott. Beautiful.  
  
"Whoa!" Logan reaches out instinctively, and his hands are on me for a moment. Just a moment. Just making sure I don't get myself killed, and then he's giving me the eyebrow with a vengeance again. "Cyke, where the hell are you tonight?"  
  
"Sorry," I mumble to him, straightening my glasses. "I'm kind of tired, I guess. I'll, uh... I'll take care of it tomorrow." I am anything but tired. It's just a lie. Pretty much everything is a lie tonight.  
  
"Forget about it," Logan tells me, transferring the light fixture from my hands to the counter. "I can tell this thing ain't safe with you." And he steps up onto the ladder, grabbing the lightbulb on the way.  
  
There are times when having my eyes hidden comes as a definite advantage. Even if he were looking down at me, Logan couldn't see past the ruby quartz glasses over my eyes. My very wide, very fascinated eyes, running up and down his body as he reaches up toward the ceiling.  
  
At least he's not in the uniform. The black, leather, skintight uniform. The one I just about begged the Professor not to let him wear. Then I couldn't look away if I wanted to. I think if I really put my mind to it right now, I could probably pry my eyes off the stretched-out muscles beneath the fabric of his shirt...  
  
"Now," he instructs with that tinge of sarcasm, "you just let me show ya how it's done."   
  
Jesus. Is he trying to do that?  
  
Of course not. He'd never waste his time purposely teasing a guy like me. Logan has got to be something like the ultimate paragon of masculinity. Which doesn't go very far explaining why I can't get him out of my head.  
  
Standing at his full height, his fingers wrapped around the lightbulb, Logan extends his arm to the ceiling and twists it expertly into the socket. His eyes fixed in concentration. That distinctive muscle tensing in his jaw.   
  
I really, really need to get him out of my head.  
  
"Uh-huh," he mutters, tightening the lightbulb's neck in place. His body slackens slowly as he draws back onto the stepladder, turning his eyes to me. At least I remember to tone my stare down to a casual look. I just hope he can't see through it all. He's looking at me so expectantly that in another time and place I'd probably jump on him. God only knows what he'd do to me then, but it's tempting.  
  
"Hey," Logan cuts in, "are you gonna give me the glass thing or not?"  
  
Glass thing. Light fixture. He means the light fixture. I actually have to glance down to see if I'm holding it. No, it's there on the counter. I grab it and hand it up to Logan, who treats me to another view of his manual skill by attaching the thing to the ceiling.  
  
He gives me a satirical smile as he jumps down from the stepladder. "Now, was that really all that painful?"  
  
No bad thoughts. No bad thoughts. "I don't know, you tell me." Oh, good, Scott. That was good.  
  
"All right, then." Rediscovering his drink, Logan downs the last of the bottle. "I didn't feel a thing."  
  
I just wish I could say the same. If he really is trying to drive me to distraction, he certainly is pulling it off perfectly.  
  
"So," he begins. "You and Jean got plans tonight?"  
  
I'm not even going to ask if he just asked what I think he just asked, because I know that's what he asked. "What kind of plans?" is my immediate response.  
  
Logan's eyes narrow a little. "Oh, y'know," he says enigmatically, fixating on me with interest. "Plans."  
  
Whatever he's trying, it's working. His nerve is actually giving me a little more heart. "Why, would that make you jealous?"  
  
Remarkably, he grins. "Jealous of you? Are ya kidding?"  
  
Either he's insulting me, or he's implying he's jealous of Jean, meaning he... don't go there, Scott. Just stay calm and don't even go there.  
  
Logan chuckles in a surprisingly good-natured way, and I feel the blood skipping in my veins. "Jealous. Huh. Shame on you, Cyke." He rakes his fingers through his hair, drawing out a long sigh as he turns toward the refrigerator.   
  
I should take this chance and escape. I really should. If I don't do it now, I know it's all downhill from here. Come on, get out of the room, Scott. Just turn around and run. I try half-heartedly to move. If only my feet weren't rooted to the floor...  
  
The refrigerator door swings open, yellow light and frost drifting out into the room, and I watch Logan examine its contents. Which aren't much, apparently. All I can see is part of a six-pack, a bottle of teriyaki sauce and some aging vegetables. Of course, I'm not all that focused on the food. Not while Logan has his back to me. "Wow," he comments sarcastically, peering into the refrigerator. He digs something out from behind the rest. "Crisco? What the hell does anybody here need that for?"  
  
I hope to God he doesn't know what he's doing to me. I'm standing here with Logan in the middle of the night, and he's holding out a can of crisco, of all things. Actually, I confiscated that stuff from Bobby Drake a few weeks ago, but that really isn't worth explaining right now. "I think," I manage to say, "you use--"  
  
"Yeah, I know, Cyke," Logan cuts in, rolling those dark, burning eyes of his and returning the stuff to its place. "Not like anybody ever cooks around here, though." He pulls open the freezer. "But maybe if -- hey, Creamsicles!" Logan pulls a long, cylindrical, plastic-wrapped popsicle from the freezer.   
  
Oh no.  
  
From the look of satisfaction on that lycanthropic face, you'd think he could hear all the thoughts running through my head right now. The only thing is, he looks far too innocent as he peels back that wrapper.  
  
Oh, please. Please don't eat that.  
  
Now it's all I can do to keep myself from heart failure as Logan slides the thing deliberately into his mouth. I don't believe this. He has me exactly where he wants me. It may not be a comforting idea, but it's still giving me that terrible kind of thrill. I know my glasses aren't hiding a thing, I know I look like an idiot, and at this point, I don't have the sense to care. At least he's not licking it, or... gulp. By now just swallowing feels unbelievably dirty.  
  
Logan drags the popsicle out of his mouth, torturously slow, and his eyes flash up to me. God, there's something in that look, something that feels awfully like an invitation. He steps a little closer, as nonchalant as I am mindless. Who bought those popsicles, anyway? Bobby?  
  
"What's the matter, Cyclops?" he kids me. "Haven't ya ever s--"  
  
And that's when the light fixture snaps off the ceiling. Logan stumbles into me as the glass contraption cracks on the floor just behind us.  
  
I can't remember a stranger moment in my life. One second I was standing a good three feet away from the man, and the next second he's practically fallen on me, using me as a brace to regain his balance.   
  
It's too late, though. I should have known. I should have run away before it all got to this point, like I should have known it would. Now every cell and every nerve in my body is on fire, and if he so much as shifted his hands right now, I don't want to know what would happen to me.  
  
"Well," Logan comments, "that was odd. Sorry about that, Cyke." He starts to pull back from me. Starts to. But like some twisted kind of paradox, my hands grip his arms and I don't let go.  
  
I have no idea where the hell I got the nerve or the courage or the stupidity to do that. I'm just standing there in the middle of the kitchen, in the middle of the night, keeping my hold on Logan, next to the shattered light. He's calm, though, held against me while my entire body is rock hard and immobilized, and as I stare down into his open eyes, he doesn't resist at all. I know he could knock me through the wall if he wanted to. He just stands there in my grasp, though, all silence and anticipation, still holding the dripping popsicle in one hand.  
  
It was him. I know it was. He's been setting me up all night, like he has since the day I dragged him off the hood of his truck. And I want to tell him what he's doing to me, but what am I supposed to say? I remember when, in the first place, I just about begged the professor not to let him in. I remember the argument, and in a second it all replays in my mind. Settle this, Xavier told us, and I wish I could but my throat is clenched so tightly I don't even think I could speak. My heart is beating like shotgun fire. It's starting to occur to me that I don't know what in the world I'm doing.  
  
Damn it, damn it, damn it.  
  
I can feel myself blush a shade deeper than my ruby quartz as I let go of Logan's sleeves, taking a step backwards and scrambling out the door.  
  
I know we were right there in front it, that point of no return, but I guess we haven't passed it yet. Not this time. Even though I don't turn around, I think as I'm disappearing from the room, I can hear him let out a short, quiet laugh. But I just leave it unsettled.  
  
  
  



End file.
